


Stay With Me

by AParisianShakespearean



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Drama, F/M, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, I kind of just wanted to write an angsty smut story if we're being 100 percent honest, Longing, Lost Love, Lyrium Withdrawal, Multi, Mutual Pining, Passionate Sex, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rekindling romance, Romance, Sadness, Smut, Smutty Angst, passionate smut, romantic sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-28
Updated: 2017-10-18
Packaged: 2018-12-08 03:18:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11637822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AParisianShakespearean/pseuds/AParisianShakespearean
Summary: There has always been a cord that has linked Cullen and Talia. Reunited at the Inquisition, they begin again. Even though they both know, that this will only end in heartbreak.This is a non canon story that serves as a "what if" scenario if Amell was Hawke's Warden contact, and she had a previous relationship with Cullen in the Circle Tower.





	1. Once Again

**Author's Note:**

> Chapter has symptoms of PTSD.

After all these years of seemingly impossible things, he should know better than to ever doubt, or ever disbelieve. Yet he sees her now, on the battlements of Skyhold, and he forgets to breathe.

Life has brought her to him. Once again.

Time has changed her, yet it has not withered her as he knows himself to be. She is older, and her green eyes are such. They carry the burdens of everything she has gone through, as do the faint lines that subtly crease her forehead as she looks at him now. Just as he stands in awe and wonder at this woman from his past, she does the same. If her wonder equals his however, he cannot tell. She was always so elusive to him, and back then he often knew he looked at her as he looked at the statue of Andraste, with reverence and love. Blasphemous, he knew. Yet he could not help the way he felt for this woman

Beautiful. She is beautiful.

But then, he thinks suddenly, that she isn’t beautiful. Beautiful is a word of this world, the one they live now. Talia, with her long mahogany hair, delicate face and even more delicate lips is not from this world. She is ethereal, a celestial being.

What did his mother used to say? That some walk among the mortals after falling from the stars? She did say that, once when he was little. He gave up on those stories long ago, but Talia makes him think that he never should have, because she is from the stars. From the stars, and into his life once more.

The long moments pass between them, and still, he can only feel the pounding of his heart. He cannot find the right words, the things he should say to her as she stands across from him on the battlements under the moon. He can only guess what she is thinking of when she looks at his form. Is it a longing for the past, or a hatred for what happened after? He cannot bear that thought, but slowly, he resigns that that is likely it. It couldn’t be anything else.

Unless she has remembered it, as he has remembered their times together before. Their kiss. The shared wonder afterward. The amazement, that a simple movement of lips meeting and parting could stir such feelings and longing. He remembers the feel, her taste. He remembers and he knows he will never forget, even when the lack of lyrium comes for him at last, and takes his mind away. 

Her mouth slightly parts as she begins to speak. Though at the last moment, she reconsiders, and allows the silence that falls between them to continue. He allows a few more moments of this, before he breaks the incantation between him. It is now, at last, that Cullen can find the words.

“You came back,” he whispers. He knows better men could find something else to say, something much more poetic and lulling. But they are his words, the only words he has.

Once again, Talia allows the silence to fall. It is very brief however, and when she answers, and he hears her voice once again after this wide gap of time, he relishes the sound of it. He has forgotten the sound over this period of time, only really remembered how his heart used to leap at the sound of it. Yet he hears it now and it is more beautiful than his mind could ever conjure in fevered dreams.

There is hint of it on her lips, the hint of a smile as she speaks. “I came back.”

It made sense, Cullen realizes. She is, after all, Hawke’s cousin on her mother’s side. They were close, he knew that much, but in all the times that he saw Hawke in Kirkwall he could never mention her. Not to Hawke anyway, who always looked at him with contempt.

Maker, she must know everything.

That is why she stands here. She is here to judge him, like so many others.

She must have already judged him for so many other things, things he has blocked from his mind, unwilling to relieve them if he can help it. But they are never truly gone, they always remain somewhere in the crevices of his mind, unseen, yet still achingly there, and willing enough to make themselves known again at certain times. If she will not judge him for that day in Kinloch than she is certainly here to talk about Kirkwall, and everything he failed to prevent. That is why she has come here to find him, fate has been the one that has brought him to her, so he can bear her judgement for it.

He expects it, but that is not what he sees. She looks at him another way. He has seen this before. Seen the way her eyes shift, a mixture of pity and—

He can’t breathe. He is falling and he can’t breathe.

“No,” he mutters, shaking his head, fending the memory off. “No…”

Maker not now, not now, _not now._

 

* * *

 

When Cullen stumbles against the battlements she is there in an instant. She kneels down and asks him, begs him to tell her what’s wrong. It was ridiculous of her to even ask him though. She already knows, she doesn’t have to ask. It happens to her too.  

Something brought him back there, brought him back to the time when they had last met. The time that she found him in that cage, on top of that Circle Tower. The things he is saying, she knows. Cullen now is breathing much too heavily, closing his eyes tight and moving his hands to his ears. He can hear it again, the sound of the torture she knows he went through, the sound of his friends around him in agony. It must be the same for him that it is for her, she thinks. She can still hear the sounds of the Archdemon, the darkspawn in the Deep Roads, and—

Not now, not now when Cullen needs her.

Quickly she turns her attention back to him. He is in his full regal armor, and the sight of this powerful man, so vulnerable and shrieking away fills her with such pity that she wants to touch him, let him know that he is not back there. He is safe now, and he will never have to be back there again. She wants to touch him, but she knows she shouldn’t. When she tried to touch him in the cage he backed away from her, petrified. It was the desire demon that took her image, she realized, it had done something to him, tortured him. All she wanted to do when she found him was assure to him that she was here now. The real her, and she would never do something like that to him. He wanted none of her words back then. He wanted the nightmare to end. So she tried again, once it ended. Once he was free from the cage, she tried to comfort him. All he gave her was a look of fear and hatred. Everything they shared from before, none of it mattered to him. She didn’t matter to him.

She shouldn’t even have tried to find him now, when the Inquisition brought her to him. She knew that but did it anyway, because…

Because…

She didn’t know why, not really. Maybe because he was the only good thing in her life before the Wardens? She shouldn’t even have bothered, especially after what Rhine told her about what happened afterward, in Kirkwall.  He may have stood with her, the Champion in the end, but as Rhine asked, did that make up for years of cowardice? Talia didn’t know. Maybe she had no right to decide that. All she could decide was if she would come find him and speak to him again if she could. Well, she wanted to see him. So she made her decision.

She didn’t know what this was for though, as she stood there by him as his breathing returned to normal, and she placed a careful hand on his. She supposed she wanted to have clarity with where they stood and who they were back then. She wanted to know that the Cullen she wanted to remember, the Cullen that blushed and ran from her, and the Cullen that had once kissed her, was a Cullen that had come back to lead the Inquisition’s army.

It was impossible though. Cullen could never be that Cullen again. Not after everything he suffered and endured. And when she saw him last, he was still a boy. In many ways, she was just a girl as well back then. Now, the Cullen before her is a man. Broken, filled with longing to do better, but different now. She saw it when their eyes first met after all this time. He’s changed.

She thinks of what happened in Kinloch and Kirkwall during and after the Blight. Mages cannot be treated like people. Cullen had said that, once.

But that is not the man she is helping now. She is helping Commander Cullen, she reminds herself as his half-focused gaze finds her again. He looks at her with such shame and embarrassment before looking away, appalled at himself that this happened in her presence.  

She chooses not to tell him this is a normal occurrence for her. Instead she wordlessly rises, grabbing him by the shoulders to help him stand. He winces, placing his hand on his side. He must have been injured in battle she thinks, she doesn’t know what else could have been the cause.

She asks him if he can walk.

He nods, placing his hand on her and stubbornly and wordlessly informing her he doesn’t need her help. “I’m fine,” he insists.

“Where is your room?”

He points to the tower, not far from where they stand. “Can you make it?” 

He nods, but takes a few steps, winces, and when he tries to hobble away he has to grip onto the battlements. He protests when she moves to him, telling her it is alright and he can help himself. Still, she takes his arm and places it over her shoulders, and together they make it to the tower where he had just pointed, opening the door with one hand. When she opens the door she is greeted to the sight of a long, sturdy desk, littered with papers. A candlestick glows and bounces off the glass of a wine bottle. A map of Ferelden and Orlais is spread out onto the table.

“I don’t—“ he begins to protest, but she cuts him off.

“Shhh. You’re not well. Where is your room?”

He motions his head to a ladder. Things have gotten more problematic. “Maker’s breath,” she says. “How will you make it up? You can barely walk.”

He removes himself from her, finally regaining some semblance of balance as he takes to the ladder, one step at a time. “I…I’m sorry you have to see me this way,” he says, gripping onto one of the steps.

“It was my fault,” she says. “I shouldn’t have—“

“It’s not your fault,” he states. “I...”

Whatever he wants to say next, he dismisses. “We can speak later,” he offers instead.

She says nothing to that, so his eyes dart away. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles, trying to head back up the ladder.

“Cullen.”

She has not spoken his name to anyone in years. Not even to Leliana or Rhine. He was always “him” when she spoke of him in passing. She didn’t know why. Perhaps saying the name made it all too real again. But now that she has said it, she wants to say it again and again.

“Cullen,” she says. “Don’t be sorry.”

He nods, and grits his teeth as he manages to climb the ladder into his loft. From below she can hear the clanking of armor falling onto the floor, and eventually the creak of the mattress.

“Are you alright?” she calls. 

There is no answer from above.

“Say something? Please?”

When again there is nothing Talia glances at the door. In lacking to give her an answer, there is the possibility that perhaps he wants her to leave, and now that she really thinks about it, she wonders why she even expected something to come from this.

Because Cullen has never left her. That’s why.

_It was the foolish fancy of a naïve boy…_

_You are a mage. I am a templar. It is my duty to oppose all that you are…_

She didn’t know if that was Cullen or the trauma he went through that said those things. She knew some things, but not the full extent of what happened in Kinloch. All she knows is that if she did not arrive when she did, Cullen may not even have even survived. He wouldn’t be here, if that was the case, raising an army for the Inquisitor, trying to make up for his past mistakes. And from what Leliana had said, he is trying to make up for his past mistakes.

But he did not answer her. He does not want her here, just as he did not want her back then.

She can’t completely blame him. Wounds heal. Those scars that do not show however, sometimes they can never heal.

She will never come to him again. Not like this. She won’t hurt him. Won’t make him relieve something he should never even have had to live through. She places her hand on the door. She is going to leave.

When it squeaks open, she can hear something. The wrestling of sheets. The call of her name.

“Talia,” he says, breathless and helpless. It is the way he used to say it, all those years ago.

“Cullen?” she calls back.

He does not answer again. There is a fire in her now though, a fire that prevents her from leaving. Her pulse quickens as she thinks about what will happen, what she will see if she traverses to his domain up the ladder. Part of her thinks maybe she shouldn’t. It is a domain that is his after all, and she would perhaps be nothing more than an unwelcome trespasser. But he has not said anything back, and if something happened to him, something because of her…

She climbs up the ladder, tentatively peaking before she climbs all the way in. He is sitting on the bed with his back toward her, head angled downward. Making the choice, she climbs into his loft. When her boots hit the hard wood of the floor, he briefly turns toward her. What passes between them is a look of regret, and shame. Biting his lip, he then turns back around, as if he didn’t expect her to actually come.

She regards his form, unclothed before her. It is not completely knew to her. Many years ago, she came to him when he was ill in the Circle when everyone else slept. He was ill that day, and she nursed him. She was so young, and she had never seen the naked chest of a man before. She remembered being amazed. He was strong and broad where she was slight, slim hips where hers were rounded. But that was Cullen the boy, and this is now Cullen the man. Here in his loft she studies his back, the ropey strength ingrained, and the scars that etch the skin. There are many that dot the plain of his back, ones that are slightly pink against his skin, and others that ghostly pale color. There is one large one however, one that catches her eye. It starts to the base of his neck and travels downward, almost halfway down. She longs to take her hand, trace the scar, and give tenderness to the area that had once given him pain.

Perhaps there was a lover who has already done that for him.

He might have a lover now, she realizes suddenly. A lover that comes to him when Skyhold rests and kisses away his burdens. She hasn’t thought of this before, Cullen with someone else before, and when she thinks of it now she feels a pang. It _shouldn’t_. Maker knows she’s had a lover after him. He’s entitled to have that, he’s entitled to have someone that makes his days easier.

She wonders though, if what they had all those years ago was what lovers have.

“Cullen,” she murmurs to his back. “Don’t lie. Will you be all right?”

He doesn’t answer the question. Instead, he asks a question of his own. “Why are you here?”

“When Rhine told me about the Wardens I had to come. I don’t want the Order to fall.”

“That’s not what I meant,” he clarifies. “Why are you here? With me?”

“You called to me.”

“I didn’t think you wanted anything else to do with me,” he admits. “I wasn’t thinking you would come.”

She tells him the truth. “I wanted to see you.”

Once again he shuts his eyes tight so he won’t have to look at her. “I’m so sorry,” she mutters, moving over toward him. “If I would have known what would happen I wouldn’t have come to you.”

“It wasn’t you,” he says. “I only remembered. It happens when I remember, sometimes. I feel as though I’m back there.”

“Because I came to you.”

“It doesn’t matter. It will happen anyway.”

He takes a deep breath and rubs his hand to the base of his neck. She studies his front, his chest that is also lined with scars, with rough pinkish skin at his shoulder blade. From fire. A mage’s fire. She tries not to think of that.

His shoulders are broad from his training, and his chest is taut. His skin is kissed by the sun, body hair on his chest and arms the same color gold as his hair. His hair has changed texture over these ten years, gone from kinky curls to full waves. While one hand rubs his neck, the other is placed on his thigh. When she first saw Cullen out of his templar uniform back then in Kinloch, it wasn’t seeing his bare chest or back that she studied the most. It was his hands, ungloved from the steel gauntlets that were a part of the templar uniform. He had, and still has a strong, masculine hand, long digits with prominent knuckles and a broad palm. When she placed her hand in his that night long ago his hand practically swallowed hers. That was what she liked, more than anything. Having his hand to hold. Being there for him. She wants to do that now, weave her fingers through his shaking hand. Be there for him now.

Shaky hand. The way his hands press into his forehead and neck. The onslaught of the memory…

He is not recovering from a battle wound. 

“Cullen, you haven’t been taking lyrium.”

“Not since Kirkwall,” he responds after a beat. “I couldn’t. Not after that.”

“It could kill you,” she says, sitting down in the chair next to his bed.

“It hasn’t yet. It…”

When he moans in suppressed agony she places her hands on his shoulders and moves him down onto the bed. He doesn’t protest and remains there as she moves to the dresser, finding a cloth, and wetting it with water from the pitcher he keeps on his dresser. Carefully she sits down on the chair next to the bedand rubs the cloth on his forehead, wiping away the sweat. He has a beard now, she thinks idly as she wipes away the rest of his face. Her fingertips are lightly tickled as she wipes the rest of the perspiration away.

Hazel amber eyes open, and long eyelashes flutter. There is a hint of a smile on his scarred lips. How did he get that scar?

“I remember something like this happening before,” he says fondly, studying her. So he remembers too.

“You had the fever,” she says. “I snuck into the templar barracks and I came to you. Remember that?”

“You did what you’re doing now.”

She nods. “I did.”

He looks at her and she sees everything. “Hawke told you,” he states.

“Yes,” she answers. “I know everything. But I also know who you were before. I don’t think Hawke does.”

“I’m so sorry I hurt you.”

“I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

“I don’t want to be bound by that life anymore. That’s why I stopped.”

He closes his eyes and she tucks the blanket to his shoulder. A stray curl has fallen on his forehead. Carefully, she pushes the lock away, like a lover would do.

A lover should be here, not her. Not the woman who has disappeared from his life, only to come back suddenly. A mage when he wants to break the chains from his old life. “Cullen?” she beckons.

“Talia,” he breathes.

“I should probably go,” she says. “You need rest, and I’m only here to remind you of your past. I’m sorry Cullen.”

She rises, but something happens. He pulls her back.

He takes her hand, amber glass imploring her to remain. “Stay,” he murmurs.

She falls to the chair again, and when he weaves her hand in his, she lets him.

It is still the same, after all this time.

Cullen. He is still Cullen.

“Stay with me,” he beseeches. “Stay.”

“I’ll stay,” she promises, brushing her fingertips over his knuckles, toying with his fingertips. “As long as you need me.”

“What if that’s forever?”

She grins at the light tease. “Then it looks like I’ll be here forever.”

“Good.”

She thinks he falls asleep not long after, it’s hard to say. Even so she doesn’t let go of his hand. She’ll stay forever, if she must.

But Maker. She can't. _She can't._  

She’ll be pulled away from this moment, and from the Inquisition again when Clarel and the Wardens are taken care of. She’ll be pulled away from Cullen again.

This is how cruel her life is. To initially bring her someone she cannot have, to then meeting him again, broken and in agony. Not himself. Then, ten years later, to see him again, when he is trying to be himself again, break the chains of the lyrium and make up for his past. She wants him to be himself again, just as she wishes she was only Talia. But she’s not only Talia. She never has been. First mage, then Warden. Hero of Ferelden.

Save for this moment. For this moment, the stars peaking through the hole in his unfixed roof, she is only Talia, holding Cullen’s hand. For this moment, she simply is.

“Cullen,” she breathes to his sleeping form. “I missed you. I missed you so much.”


	2. The Beginning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow. Wasn't sure I was going to update this, but miracles never cease!

He remembers last night before his eyes even open.

In his foggy, addled mind he had asked her to stay with him during the night, reason disappearing in favor of selfishly keeping her with him. He shouldn’t have asked that of her. It was unfair to expect the two of them going back to whatever it was they were before, and pretend like the things he said in the past matter. He fully expects to see that she has disappeared with the night, her sense reasserting itself. He expects to open his eyes and see that he is alone in his loft, just as he always his.

That’s not what he sees, when at last he opens his eyes.

She remained with him during the night, and while he thinks he recalls feeling her fingers idly brush his knuckles before he passed out, she must have let go at some point during the night, as now her palms are flat against the sheets. Her cheek also rests against his sheets, long dark eyelashes resting against high cheekbones. It may partially be the position she’s in, but Talia looks so much younger as she sleeps. He thinks for a moment of smoothing her mahogany hair away from her face, running his fingers through it, but instead he favors simply looking at her, allowing this moment before she wakes to go on. Like this, it’s easier to forget the wide stretch of time that has passed since last he’s been with her. He never had the best imagination, but he tries to pretend that they are back in the Circle, before any of this. He tries to pretend they are just Cullen and Talia, but they’ll never just be Cullen and Talia. And if he thinks they can after what happened, he truly is a greater fool than he ever thought. What happened in the past can never be undone.

The memories that persist don’t stop him from admiring her. She’s radiant in this early dawn light, the lines that mark her years spent in the Wardens faded as she sleeps. He wonders what experiences brought her those lines. Yes he knows the story of the Blight, but he doesn’t know the things in between the major events. Save one, of course.

She stirs and her eyes flutter open. There is no confusion, no blinking in surprise at the unfamiliar room. There is however, a smile as she regards him.

“Good morning,” he greets.

She finger combs her hair. “I’m sorry I stayed the night. I must have been more exhausted than I realized.”

“I wanted you to stay.”

His mind isn’t foggy, nor is he still lost in the surreal nature of seeing her again. He is in his right mind when he places his hand on hers.  
“Do you remember the first time we did this?” Cullen asks her.

Holding hands while he was sick in the templar barracks. Her coming to him, holding him, just being. She smiles as she nods, memories being recalled.

He thinks together they’re reliving that memory again, being together, young and carefree. Thinking that someday they could live somewhere far away from the tower, not a mage or a templar, but just as Talia and Cullen. They talked about that, dreamed about it.

That was impossible then. It’s even more impossible now.

Perhaps that’s why even though he’s disappointed when she withdraws, gathering herself and her bearings, he lets her. “I should go,” she states, throwing her cloak over her shoulders. “I promised I would speak to Leliana, and you…well, I’m sure you have work to do. We can speak later maybe.”

“Talia, wait.”

Pausing at the crawlspace she turns toward him, eyes prompting him to speak. He isn’t sure what he should say, truthfully he only asked her to stay because he wanted to get another look at her before she ascends down the ladder. Morning light suits her, and she is painted beautifully in it, the sun from the hole in his roof bringing out lighter tones in her long mahogany hair. Her skin is flushed pink, lips pinker. And her green eyes have not the hint of hazel in them. They are pure green, like an emerald. He is hit with melancholy. Out of all the people in the world, the Maker has chosen her to bear the sorrow of ten people. She has suffered in her life, he knows it too well from the stories. He knows he’s caused many of her sufferings, and he thinks he should be punished for that. But why did the Maker pick her? What had she ever done that made her deserve the life she had been given? At least with himself and his sufferings, he knew he deserved it. But Talia? Beautiful, ethereal Talia?

This woman has every right to hate her lot. Locked in a tower for her adolescent life, reading about the experiences she would never get to in books. At least, that’s what she always thought, until that Grey Warden came. Talia though, at least outwardly, does not complain or swear, or hate her lot. She accepts her life. He longs to tell her how much he admires her for it, how he truly has never met another quite like her.

He longs to tell her how he wants her.

He can feel the hunger stir within, tingling his body and arousing him as he thinks of placing his hands on her hips and pressing her flush against his body. Maker he wants to hear her mewl for him, capture the cries of pleasure and delight she’ll make as he places his hands everywhere and—

“Cullen?”

He bites his lip, hard. It’s not doing anything to suppress his arousal. Why did his thoughts even drift there? He’s despicable, vile and…

“I just wanted to thank you,” Cullen finally states. “Thank you for staying with me.”

She looks down at the ground, but smiles, nods, and descends the ladder. He feels empty when she leaves, and emptier still when he carelessly brings his own relief, his seed hot in his hands.

Empty and alone, he still wants.

 

* * *

 

Leliana has changed.

Talia knew this the moment she meant the Inquisition’s spymaster once more, and those feelings haven’t changed as Leliana regales the tale of the Inquisition thus far, the two overlooking the courtyard down below from the balcony up in her rookery. Leliana speaks highly of the Inquisitor Lavellan, and how even though she Dalish, and a mage on top of it all, she easily wears the title. How easily she can charm nobles to her side and how she skillfully mastered the game, back in the Winter Palace when the Inquisition was forced to try to save Empress Celene. Leliana tells the whole story and leaves nothing out.

All the while, _his_ face still remains, and what they shared. What remains is how much of her craves for more.

Yet Leliana weaves the story of the Inquisition with her words, and Talia listens. But as she goes on, she can’t help but feel the pangs of sorrow. Once she thinks, really thinks however, she realizes it’s not sorrow that she feels. It’s disappointment.

When the two of them traveled together, gathering the army that would eventually march to Denerim, Leliana would gather up everyone at camp and regale old stories from Ferelden and Orlais. She had such zeal and flourish back then as she wove the tale of Aveline and Alindra. Now, she tells the story of the Inquisition like one would read names off of a list. She’s weary and carries the weight of the Inquisition on her shoulders, and she still grieves for the divine. Talia knew Leliana became Justinia’s right hand, as they still wrote when it happened, and Talia was still living in Denerim at the time. The letters stopped not long after. And Talia knows she shouldn’t be disappointed at the change in Leliana. Maker knows she’s also changed. But out of all the people that Talia met, and out of all the friends that she has made over the years, she always thought Leliana would be the one that remained as she was. Full of life, and hope. Even over Alistair, Talia thought Leliana would always have her faith and zeal, and lust for life.

Then again, who has been there for her, now that Justinia is gone?

“What will you do, after this business is settled?” Leliana asks Talia, the two overlooking the courtyard as the mountain breeze provides a gentle comfort as they speak of the past and future.

“Go back to the before,” Talia answers. “I must do this. For all of us.”

“What if you spend all your time searching and you don’t find what you are looking for?”

Talia has thought of that, just as she also knows that her time on this plain will not last forever. But she must do what she must do. “I must still search,” Talia asserts.

“What of Alistair?”

“Alistair is married now.” She states it flatly and with no emotion.

“That means nothing.”

“It’s everything Leliana. I…I couldn’t. He respected that.”

It was not easy to keep Alistair in her life as her lover after he became king. For a while it may have been, but soon after his coronation the two of them learned very quickly that his duties as a king must always come first, even his duties as a Grey Warden. Maker knows, Eamon never approved of Talia and Alistair’s illicit relationship. He may have never said so aloud, but he always made it apparent in his disapproving looks whenever Alistair would try to covertly hold her hand, or steal a kiss hidden behind palace walls. Talia often heard many frustrated arguments between Eamon and Alistair, her relationship with the king the center of it.

She never liked the word. _Mistress._ Maybe because she wanted, more than anything, to be his wife.

But he has a new wife now. One who will carry the heir to the throne of Ferelden. And she left were he could not follow.

“You really wanted to part?” Leliana asks her.

Talia shrugs in indifference. “What I want has always been irrelevant.”

Leliana doesn’t respond to that. Instead she leads Talia back inside her rookery, and Talia doesn’t say that in truth, she really doesn’t know what she wants. There’s the obvious of course, succeeding in her goal. The Inquisition winning this was against Corypheus. But beyond that?

She’s at quite the loss. She doesn’t have time or will to think about what she wants. Living is enough.

Then she sees his face. Cullen. And it hits her, right in the core. She wants. 

Eventually, Leliana breaks her from her thoughts. “There is something…you need to know,” she says.

“What?”

She sighs. “Morrigan is here.”

 _She must be here with him then,_ Talia quickly thinks. “Where is she?” she demands.

“Usually in the garden. Wait, are you—”

Talia absolves to come speak to Leliana later, but now there is only one thought that runs through her mind. She ascends down the stairs, walks across the Inquisition’s hall and goes into the garden. Sure enough, there she is, kneeling down in front of a garden of elfroot.

“Morrigan,” Talia announces.

Few things take Morrigan, the witch of the wilds by surprise, and Talia can only see the barest hint of shock in Morrigan’s yellow gaze as she rises. Maker, she looks exactly the same as she last saw her. In Leliana’s eyes and demeanor, Talia could see the way time had changed her. No so for Morrigan.

“Tis…good to see you,” Morrigan offers. “I did not think I would see you again.”

“No?” Talia wonders.

“I had hoped,” Morrigan admits. “But it does make some sense, with the arrival of the Champion.”

She sighs, and if this woman were anyone else, Talia thinks she would embrace her. They were friends, once. Perhaps even sisters. Morrigan had said as much.  _Live my friend. Live gloriously._

Well, look how that turned out.

“May I see him?” Talia asks.

Morrigan motions to the pavilion. “Over there.”

When Talia turns, she sees the boy, studiously reading through a book. She didn’t know what she was expecting, but this boy, this normal looking boy, perfectly content and serene in the garden, she didn’t expect that. No. She didn’t expect anything so…normal.

“Kieran,” Morrigan says. “That’s his name.”

“There’s no Alistair in him at all,” Talia muses. “Only you.”

Morrigan doesn’t say anything, but she smirks, and as Kieran comes over, Talia finds herself kneeling to his level.

“Hello,” he says, dreamily.

“Hello Kieran,” Talia says. “It’s good to meet you.”

“You’re blood. It’s strange.”

Talia recoils, glancing at Morrigan, who was steely as ever. “Kieran,” she begins. “Do not—”

“The nightmares. Are they that bad?”

Talia thinks, and considers. She speaks.

“Sometimes,” she says after a moment. “But I endure. I do what I must. It’s what I’ve always done.” What I will always do. Even when…

It is Morrigan who speaks, and it is the most surprising of all. “Everyone has a right to happiness. Once and a while. Even if they must take it.”

 

* * *

 

It’s warm in the tavern at night. Almost too warm from the heat, and the dancing, and all the people crowded into one room. Cullen hardly ventures in here, but he thinks that tonight, maybe the mead will quell his thoughts. Thoughts of Talia.

Low and base thoughts. He tries to push them aside.

He can’t. He hasn’t been able to, since he first saw her again.

Memories, everything flooded back when she did. What could have been, what never could have been. He tries to make these thoughts abate, but nothing is working. Not even here, in the tavern, caught up in heat and the merriment of everyone else. When he eventually exits, he thinks he’ll try to train tonight, read over more reports, something of that sort. He’s not exactly sure as he walks up the steps to his office. Something, anything.

But as it would be had, there is Talia. There. Just as she is in his thoughts.

“Cullen,” she greets, pushing a lock of hair away from her face. “I didn’t know I would see you.”

“You are standing right outside my office,” he points out.

“I know, but...” she shakes her head, embarrassment and shame evident. “I’m sorry.”

“Please don’t be sorry,” he says.

When the silence passes between them, she shifts closer to him. And when she does, she makes a confession. A confession that somewhere in his mind, he already knew.  
“Maybe, I was hoping to see you,” she says.

“Maybe I wanted to be found,” he replies, knowing there has always been a cord that has linked the two of them. Always has been, since she came back to save him in the Circle tower.

Her eyes are burning into his. She makes a second confession. “I can’t stop thinking about last night, and this morning.”

“Neither can I. Talia. I want…”

When he doesn’t finish, she eggs him on. “What Cullen?”

He tells her, and he cannot take them back. But what’s more. He won’t take them back. He will never take them back.

 

* * *

 

The words remain in the air.

Stay with me tonight.

Talia stands against a precipice and divide, Cullen on the other side. She of course, knows, in no uncertain terms, what he is suggesting. Her heart still quickens, body tingling.  
A fool would have looked at the two of them and known that there is unfinished business, a want that has not been quelled. But to act on it, to give in…after all these years? Is it better to just let it be?

Even as she thinks that, he makes it clear. “You don’t have to do this,” he says.

“Stay with you?”

He shakes his head. “I understand, if you don’t want to stay. You can leave now, if you want. We don’t have to pretend this happened.”

“I want this.”

Perhaps it is better to let it be. Better to not make this worse. It would open more wounds, make their eventual parting more difficult again. But more than any of this, she does not care. She wants. She wants, and she can have. So she will take.

They stand together, and when he places his gloved palm against her cheek, his eyes are filled with wonder, and something else. Something she wants more of. It’s primal, it’s unknown to her in her gentle Cullen, who she came to care for in the Circle Tower. Who she thought she lost that day when she found him trapped.

But this Cullen, this man. She wants. She wants to stay. Maker, she wants to stay.

“I…I’ve wanted this for so long. I didn’t know how much until you came back, and…Maker forgive me for suggesting this. Maker, I—”

“Shhh,” she soothes. “There’s nothing to forgive.”

“I don’t think I can be gentle. Not tonight anyway. Not after…”

She leans in, her lips to his ear. Her breath caresses his neck as he closes his eyes, and she whispers, “Maybe I don’t want gentle.”

Her invitation, her prayer. Her plea. Have me however you want me.

He takes it, and he has no regrets when he does. He leads her back to his office, back upstairs. And what they have wanted for so long, they begin to have.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Smut in the next chapter :)


End file.
